Germany looked very dangerous and playing good football.
Got a feeling for the Italians and would fancy the winner to come from France,Germany,Italy and maybe Spain.
We don’t appear to have a general discussion thread fir the competition so I’ll start one by saying Germany looked dangerous today!
I know they’re in a very difficult group but I think they’ll be going through.
Germany looked very dangerous and playing good football.
Got a feeling for the Italians and would fancy the winner to come from France,Germany,Italy and maybe Spain.
Two own goals today were a shock, although they were brought about by intense threat of Germany scoring.
Didnt think England were very good againt Scotland.
Wales will get a beating by Italy, to be fair though i think Italy will go far this year.
My money went on Italy pre-tournament and I've been very impressed so far. A few teams have been good so far but only Italy have been consistently good. Impossible to pick a winner at this stage.
italy always turn up at the big tournaments and they haven’t failed to do so again, i really fancy italy, their defensive record will get them places and they are scoring goals too, a definite threat
Italy still looking good despite making a lot of changes to the team, impressive so far.
Expecting England to be involved in a snooze fest tonight as normal.
For me get Grealish, Foden, Sancho all on the pitch together and drop a DM.
Shame Trent is injured as I would have went with him and Kyle Walker too and just went all out attack.
We are going to get knocked by in the quarters or semis anyway so try and be entertaining until we do.
England need to draw or lose tonight in order to avoid France, Germany or Portugal.
A win would be the worst result possible.
I’m expecting the manager to unleash Maguire and Henderson on the Czechs tonight.
Why is Sancho not playing?
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What a tedious match. This is what it must feel like to support Burnley.
Mind you Portugal sh*thoused their way to the title last time so there is hope yet.
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Last edited by ryanb741; 22nd June 2021 at 21:51.
An ultimately disappointing tournament for Scotland. Summarizing it I’d say the style of football Clarke has them playing is quite attractive and as a squad it’s a very young team. I’m actually encouraged by what I saw and the only thing missing was a touch of composure up front or a little luck. Overall though I enjoyed watching them play which has not always been the case.
Till next time Scotland. Well done to England and in particular Wales for progressing.
??
Be interesting to see if Foden gets back into the side ahead of Grealish and in particular Saka.
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England start well but seem to just fizzle out
The better sides (whoever out of the ones we get next now as all the options are ace) will i believe put us out
We have some great players
But not a great team
Italy look awesome - the constant wish to move forwards is exciting to warmth rather than the tedious tip tap side to side and backwards motion if our own boys in white
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I think winning the group was marginally the better option. If we'd finished 2nd we may have had an "easier" last 16 game (remember Iceland though) but it wouldn't have been at Wembley.
And then if we'd got to the quarters we'd have played France, Germany or Portugal anyway but not at Wembley.
So it's preferable to win the group and have the advantage of playing France, Germany or Portugal at Wembley in the last 16 with 40000 fans behind us.
I was at Wembley last night. Not the most inspiring game but a win is a win and not conceding any goals in the group phase is encouraging.
Everything rides on our next game, if Southgate's tactics work against a top team he'll be considered a genius, but if we go out with a whimper his cautious approach will come under extreme scrutiny.
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Last edited by watchcollector1; 23rd June 2021 at 08:58.
I don't like the format of the present tournament. I don't think it works well with 24 sides taking part. The problem with third-placed competitors going through from most of the groups is that some of the suspense is robbed from the group stage, and this was apparent when England and a few other sides tumbled through to the knockout stage on Monday night without a ball being kicked in their groups on the same day.
The best solution probably is to have 16 countries (or geographical regions in the case of Wales, England etc) competing. But for 24 sides, here's the fix.
You have an initial group stage with 6 groups of 4 like the present format, but only the first and second in each continue in the competition. These go through to a second group stage with 4 groups of 3.
The winners of these four groups would make up the semi-finalists.
My arithmetic tells me that a tournament of this format would consist of 51 games (assuming no runner-up playoff), which is the same as the present format.
Secondary group stages have been tried before in most tournaments, they never last long. Nothing kills the excitement of qualifying from your group like realising all you have done is qualified for another group!
Group stage is like a soup starter - not very exciting but gets you in the mood for the main course. I’d rather have straight knockout all the way than the tedium of 2 group stages
Watched the game last night, first half was good with more of a structured attacking format. The second was less passable, not much to get excited about. They did enough though but need to step up a few gears against the better teams.
Seeing as we will be playing France, Germany or Portugal in the next round that makes it 90 more minutes of England banality to suffer before we are eliminated on Tuesday evening.
F.T.F.A.
Souness nailed it last night “Scotland play football from a different era” then questioned Clarke’s inability to change things when it was clearly going wrong.
Disaster from the start:
Failure to pick Gilmore in the Czech game when the whole of Scotland were crying out for it, then comes across as some sort of messiah when he picks him for the England game!
Been looking for a striker for years then when we get one he’s benched for the easiest game to win.
Scotland’s strongest area is midfield so we bypass them and play long balls to a lone striker.
Plays one left back at centre half to accommodate both left backs in the team
Plays a midfielder at centre half though he never plays there for his club side.
Plays with a defensive right back in an attacking full back system even though he has an attacking full back on the bench.
You English think you have it bad with Southgates negative tactics but you have no idea what an innovator you have compared to Clarke.
That looks a full stadium in Budapest!
Just watching France v Portugal and a couple of interesting penalties
I FEEL LIKE I'M DIAGONALLY PARKED IN A PARALLEL UNIVERSE
Interesting indeed!
The French penalty was unbelievable. Like. Seriously??
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We have no chance against these two.
Last night we played like a crab on the beach, back, back, sideways, back, back, sideways!
This is the game of the tournament (Portugal v France) with some fantastic football and a couple of unbelievable saves. We have no chance against either of these. How can it be fair that Czech Republic finish third and get Sweden yet we win our group and get France, Germany or Portugal (or Hungary).
I'm always baffled when Scots lay into Rangers. From an agnostic perspective it seems like Rangers are the good guys being bullied by ideological lunatics. The treatment of Rangers during the whole relegation situation was IMHO outrageous. Glad they are back, they deserve it and I see Rangers as the true representatives of Scottish elite football and Celtic more of a fundamentalist caricature. But YMMV.
England v Germany will be an absolute sh*tfest of a game. Suspect England will get through though
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Scottish elite football
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I don’t think we’ve seen the best from our lads, they’re all young, fit as fleas and more than capable than capable of beating the Germans. Personally I’m glad we’ve got the them next round, it’ll be a proper test which if they can win will surely put them favourites.
Last edited by Franky Four Fingers; 23rd June 2021 at 22:13.
Because we are a unionist club despised by the majority that are looking for independence
Sturgeon couldn’t wait to lay into Rangers after George square, not a peep after what went on in London last week.
Now Scotland today has recorded their highest ever number of positive COVID results, most are men between 18 to 44. By all accounts a fair number of them were in London.
Still nothing from Nippy, wouldn’t go down well criticising her disciples!
Gilmore played well as did Hanley,McGregor,O’Donnel and quite a few others in the England game
Scotland has a history of heaping praise on young guys and hailing them as the new messiah after a couple of decent games.
Let the young boy develop without all the expectancy on his shoulders.
We have no clue whether he would have made a difference in either the opening game or the final game but the manager sees the players in training and makes the decisions and probably showed a bit of loyalty to the players that got him there and the fact that Gilmore had a good 10 mins against Luxembourg obviously wasn’t enough to sway Clarke.
If you know Scottish football there is a narrative amongst Rangers fans that Clarke is anti Rangers and so the knives were always going to be out for him by them at the first opportunity.
Well England came out of last night with the best possible outcome, Germany are eminently preferable to Portugal or France and then avoiding ALL the decent teams until the final
Wow, so much criticism and negatively towards something which is suppose to be entertainment.
Perhaps it’s time to just enjoy the skill, athleticism and dramatic comedy on display or simply ignore.
Personally I have opted for the latter and never enjoyed a major football tournament more.
Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.
Friedrich Nietzsche
If a team is good enough they should be up to playing anyone on their day. All this ducking, diving, what if’s is immaterial, yes you can and have to dream but also be realistic for expectations. Goes for any sport or competition
I thought exactly the same
Seen him make some real thick posts and this is right up there.
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You just know its going to go to penalties!
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Nothing to do with Clarke being seen as anti Rangers. Statistically that is the worst Scotland performance ever at a
major event.
Team selections have been poor and tactics have been poor, this is a manager that was given the Scotland job after 2 years of the most negative football seen in Scotland and that takes some doing.
Against Croatia we were getting swamped in the middle of the park 2nd half, what does he do takes off a midfielder and brings on a winger! Why not bring on Turnbull, Celtics player of the season and in the running for young player of the year.
Scotland have a good few young players coming through and for some reason we are scared of playing them, every other country gets them on. If your good enough age shouldn’t come into it.
Strachan or Ross would be a better bet than Clarke. As Souness said this is football from a different era!